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Industry Design Terms

Lesson 12 from: Function-Driven Interior Design

Tobi Fairley

Industry Design Terms

Lesson 12 from: Function-Driven Interior Design

Tobi Fairley

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Lesson Info

12. Industry Design Terms

Lesson Info

Industry Design Terms

And that you said a little bit about your ofthe house um after yesterday but anything on your mind today as we move into liken intention or a goal that you want to get out of the course as we move forward something we haven't covered yet well, you weren't with us yesterday I don't know if you got to see leslie any of the content but eh? So you're dealing kind of like lisa, you have a similar space, but like what would be the one big thing that would really help you thought you could take that away? I think the one big thing would be like a process or a way of thinking about how to arrange the space, so I feel like I look at a lot of magazines or tv shows and I see lots of beautiful spaces and think, oh, well, I kind of like this or like that, but I don't feel like I have a really good way of actually having a step by step process to think about how to organize and plan my say so feels very scattershot. So, um, you know, I have this very open undefined space and even though I own it, I'...

m not allowed to do any architectural changes so I can put up walls, remove windows so I really have to work with just furniture or rugs or things like that how should I think? And I love to put things in a in a structure in a system so I think that will help you with that for sure because that's the approach is also a very common sense straightforward one so I think that will help you with that this leak thank you for being here unless so how about you? Um I think you know what? I just enjoying this whole tutorial to be honest there's so many little things that I'm picking up I don't really have any blaring things I want to work on have we talked to you into working on your own house yet? Are you still thinking about the studio and your job kind of it definitely I did go home and I thought well I do have ah corner fireplace so I was like oh that's why I this room has just never worked for me so maybe I'll just accept it one day and actually paint embrace it, embrace it and tie things together okay, good. How about you, lisa? Um I am going to be listening and looking for, um storage solutions and how tio keep the clutter out of my face and I think today in the afternoon is when we have right the organizing section so we're gonna talk about some creative ways to organize things lighter today that and what to do with e giant big blank walls so those two things, so that's what michael was saying he had this long, long on some of the challenges, I took a peek at some of the ones we're going to be looking at on the fly later in the next section, too, and there were several people who have these enormous walls or hallways and what really to do with this? And it is a challenge so good. Well, we will try to address all of this. Well, I thought it would be fun today this morning to just start with some getting you comfortable with some terms, some design term. So we forget that in the design industry, melissa in is but, you know, we forget that we use thes words that no one's ever heard of or, you know, we might be describing things in the way that people don't really know what that means. So I thought, since we've now we wait until the end, of course are, you know, halfway through course three, but we're going explain to people what some of these things are that we've been talking about on now through all of my courses and what they really mean, particularly with regard to function and design in general, so we came up with a really clever, fun way. Teo, go through this idea of what, what we're talking about in design, what some of these things mean and how that you can put them to work for you. So I'm actually going to get out of the way and sit down so we can I can see them myself a little bit better, but let's, think about this in a clever way, and I wanted you to think that work through this crossword puzzle with me today, so we'll go through each one and we'll see if you know how many of, you know, the host can weigh in, if you don't know, maybe they know what some of these words are, and I'll give you some examples, and we'll just go through a little kind of, like, design one oh, one, uh, back to the basics challenge with some of the terms that we use in interiors, which I think will be fun some of our people online, maybe trying, teo, that have already gotten our glossary of terms, we won't let them way in until until we give it a try first. So so the first one is a place able to be reached or entered, so that maybe is a little bit vague, but let's, look at some examples of what this is, um, so this is, um well, I guess we go guess we'll give you the word first aren't I should've let you guess first ok, so I can't work my own my own one so I'm giving you a hint on the first one a really strong here um and this word would be accessible on let me give you some some examples of this because we talk about this a lot. This might mean something that maybe isn't it has a few meanings in design, so something that's accessible to everyone may mean that it's easy to get it's available in a store or it's accessible to a lot of people meaning it's in a budget price point that a lot of people can afford but it also has a meaning when it comes to, um, a ta like handicapped and elderly residents and people that we're dealing with to make a room or a space more accessible to them that they can move freely. And, um, and then it works for people with disabilities. So, um, that's next time I won't tell you the word before we look at the the let you guess, but that one was a little tricky to I think it was a little bit big bit of place able to be reached or entered so meaning even, you know, a place in design like a category that's accessible to everyone and a lot of what we do here at creative life as we try to bring great design and make it accessible to people all for free actually write s so this is a great one so I'm just thinking about different kinds of accessibility I mean, it might just mean to make something easily accessible to you on a daily basis so maybe a beautiful way to keep your toiletries or even you know, just these things that you cotton balls and things you use on a daily basis on the sink there easily accessible for daily use or maybe they're accessible to children or to you know, we talked a lot about bathrooms yesterday because everybody wants things to be accessible but they want them to look beautiful or even be out of sight right on and not have to to look at them all the time or looking something that seems cluttered so how many of you are dealing with needing things to be more accessible in the bathroom um but not wanting them to be on the counter do you need to deal with that? Do you leslie my drawers so I'm very sensitive to stuff being on my bathroom counter who drives me crazy so every morning I take everything out and then I put everything back in the drawer but I know it's like for the rest of my family drives them a little bit bonkers well, and I think that's an interesting point, as we were all talking about that yesterday, so in our minds, I guess we all think that there should be this magical scenario where we could have everything at arm's length all the time and not have to put it away, but also not have to look at it, right? Like we shouldn't have to work tohave things orderly or beautiful, and it really doesn't ever end up working that way. So I guess we're all being a tad bit lazy when we want things at our fingertips, but to look beautiful to so there's, another step or two when we were talking, lisa and I were both thing we's baskets and other containers within shelves, and it works really well, so that does make things be able to be accessible to you if you can pull it down, put it on the counter top and then put it back away. But I do find it interesting that in design in general, when I worked with clients, everybody wants things right here, right at their fingertips, but then they don't want to have to look at it either, and it's sort of that I have your cake and eat it, too thing, and so we have to come up with the least number of step. Tohave to put things away but knowing that you can't have it perfectly easy with absolutely no work right or it's not going to be totally beautiful on there's a little bit of compromise there but this is one way to think about accessibility is if it's easily accessible teo the same thing with things like towels so this is sort of ah hotel approach right, tio tio keeping something that utilitarian like your towels and it's beautiful and their tidy if depending on the towels that you have now, if you don't have if you have the towels you had still from college that air thirty years ago in their tattered it's probably not going to look really great, right? So this client wanted to be able to have towels and wash clothes and hand towels and things right at hand. So of course we have lots of other hidden storage in this bathroom, a lot of it in fact, I really love this is my design and this wasn't a remodelling project of a house that had been this client's grandmother, so it was a house that was probably built in the nineteen forties tudor style, but once one story really long horizontal house with large rooms and we were able to do a lot of custom work and so we were blending masculine and feminine here this is the master bathroom but we put in a whole lot of storage here and I think what he'll think about this cabinetry would this be something that allows you I like the combination of the open accessible storage and then the clothes storage um does that look like something that would help some of you to think in this way toiletries and all of these cabinets there's a tv in the center of this cabinet um any comments or thoughts on that idea? Um I think that's an amazing bathroom just for the accessibility of the aspect of it because I think when you live in the bay area to you're used to like pedestal sinks and if if that a medicine cabinets you really you realize how much storage and the bathroom is actually valuable so I think that that's three this would be a total indulgence for youto have storage in the bathrooms throw it all in there so this is definitely in a part of the country where we have a lot of space to spread out and we have larger homes. This is probably about five thousand square feet and it's all on a single floor so it's it seems really expansive, but we did a lot of we didn't spend a lot of time making sure that we had the organization, the storage really right for this client, so I think this really works great for them on dit also if this was even in the gas stream it's nice to have things that people are going to need like the towels in a place where they can see them so that they don't have to go rummaging through you know people feel a little uncomfortable opening all of the cabinets in someone else's home so it would be really great for a guest spaces well ah and it's certainly good for anyone at any age is great for kids elderly so this is exciting also goes to that um aging in place issue with accessibility as well okay so this time I'm not gonna tell you the tell you the answer yet until some of you guess eso bringing together composition with similar units these air a little hard at the first because we don't have any letters bringing together how do you bring something together with similar units it's not nothing it's cohesive cause it doesn't look like there's enough words they're letters there I'm range these terrible across the way letters to work with harmony but it is not the right tents for the question hi harmony nam and eyes that they would no common eyes let's see if sally's right e work I'm impressed I don't think I could have gotten that if I didn't know the answer and didn't make up the crossword eso harmony is a word that means bringing together composition with similar units things working together in harmony and we talk about this it's kind of like balance a little bit and we talk about this with regard to some of the design principles, but as you're working in your space, something like harmony really does add to the function of a space right cause it keeps the visual noise down there's not a lot of things that add stress in your space if everything's working in harmony so it might be the color palette, it might be a lot of other things, so let's, look at some examples of how we could have harmonious interior so this room really even though it has strong colors which you might not think of as necessarily stress free it's really has that kind of aqua base underneath which is is a soft color and it just works in harmony because we've used a stay, a color palette, a color combination and moved that throughout the space so everything in the spaces really harmonious together with regard to the aqua and red tone, the neutral base of the sofa and the wall color and even some of the textures and patterns are being repeated. So this is ahh harmonious color palette and even harmonious mix of textures in this space and it's important for function because it really helps the flow of a room when you move even from room to room and when we talk back in the color course I would say the way that I transitioned color palettes are made are harmonious color palette throughout a house would be to take one or two of the colors and transition them from room to room say like in the next room was just aqua and beige um the room after that might be aqua beige and you can even introduce another color like orangerie hello or something else on it would be this fluid motion this flow through the house and so any time you have that fluidity and color and texture it adds to a come effort level in a home which also adds to the function because it does making more relax in the space um here's another another example of a harmonious color palette and one of the things that's really used to well to several things that are used to tie this together so a custom made rug and a commission piece of artwork so sometimes we create harmonious environments in the interior design it depends on your style some people like things to be more haphazard, more accidental more collective not quite so coordinated but this one is pretty coordinated even though it is more of an urban or almost a retro sort of feeling to this space how do y'all feel about this? But I see you like this isn't it like I think that's a yellow that you react teo you either really love it or you you know it's a little hot. This is my work from a client several years ago and it's interesting. She what she was trying to replicate was the feeling of her grandparent's home in the seventies that she really loved. So could you see the axe that we went? So I went to her grandparent's home and a lot of it was actually still there was a very expensive custom residents and customs sculpture, drugs. And so we had this fun drug made by angela adams who does these really quirky, fun pieces intentionally toe look like the sculpture drugs of the seventies, uh and then paired this it's actually, some people think it looks maybe it's actually a chocolate brown. Um so fa so it's brown and yellow. Uh, a lot of people think this is navy so it's chocolate in yellow, which makes it even more of that sort of seventies era color palette, and we really use this this palette to transition into other parts of the space. So it's definitely throughout the room and we have this harmonious, uh, flow going through this entire house is well, not only in color palette, but in style and look and s o it, but we've used things like the artwork to bring the whole palette together so it's a piece of modern art but it's still very reminiscent of artwork that you saw in that time period as well, the seventy so we looked at a lot of the famous artist from that time modern artist that you would see, like in the moment in new york city, and we had an aa local artist do something in that john or our that flavor to give harmony to this space. I'm here is that the one we saw yesterday, another view that we saw the before and after of this space where we had the sleeping quarters and the the lounging area, and so this is another view and one of the thing, what do you think makes this have harmony? It's very balance balance? Exactly. So we've got a pair of mirrors, a pair of lamps, a pair of tables, two pairs of pillows. Everything is very symmetrical on very balanced, so when something is well balanced, it really almost sings it's just in harmony together, everything works, everything speaks to each other again. Some people don't like things this structured this balance, this symmetrical. It depends on the personality type, um, but certainly a space that's in harmony. A lot of people find this this design and interesting also because I used to mirrors because a lot of people would think you needed to use three are youse won you know there's a thing about using id numbers of things that people feel like is a rule in design and so sometimes I show people that it's not necessarily about having a spiff it specific number it is more about if it's a balanced if it's pleasing to the eye and if it works then it could work in your space okay, this is a um um ah hyphenated word blank purpose meaning having several functions lisa multipurpose we're getting a little easier not to take anything away from your right answer but we've talked a lot already and that's kind of what you said your big takeaway was that having things that are multipurpose right pieces of furniture all sorts of things so let's look at a few ideas they're multipurpose so this is kind of a clever just a fund when this was a this is more staging or styling for a show house that I did but the idea that accessories these air not only beautiful they're actually even edible so it's like entertaining here and adding a pop of color through something that could actually be used so this could, you know, working a lot of other ways and something else that could be both practical not necessarily edible, something you could use but also look at at the same time so this is a fun way to add beauty to this space through proper you can add beauty through very functional things is the point here that we talked about yesterday? Even if it's the collectible bowl that you use for the male to go in every day, why have a boring basket when you could buy something beautiful and let it actually be functional for you as well? And these added a fun pop of color. So this is ah, we have the picture without harley. She disappeared today. We saw her in this space yesterday, my dog. But this is my bedroom for my last house, and so the piece here that his multi purpose is that the bench, the expense so it can do a lot of things that conservative seating conserve as a place to put your feet it conserve as a place to hold things that can have a tray on it and becomes a table. So these air great for at the foot of the bed that could be next to a stool that khun b pulled up to a coffee table next to you as an ottoman, for additional seeing next to a table there's all kinds of things you can do with these kinds of small pieces of furniture. It's kind of what I was suggesting yesterday too, and you were saying how far is too far away from for the chairs to be on the other side of a coffee table. And so thinking about these kind of small pieces that can float around the room can pull up two different, um, areas to add function are really great multipurpose pieces. Do you have anything like that already? Any small pieces? Um, I don't know, so be thinking about we were talking yesterday when theresa was here, she was saying she had a hard time finding really small tables, those air a great little multipurpose piece to that could move around, but certainly thinking of all kinds of small benches and stools. I love these kind of things that you love to use them in pairs. I sometimes use them, even in triplicate. At the end of the bed, I'll put two under a console table. I'll hug them up next to a coffee table so you'll see lots of small stools and benches and surfaces like this that are upholstered, that khun b seating or a table in a lot of my work. So would you recommend upholstering a piece like that? So you're showing it with some beverages like so I should be worried about so this one is velvet, but you know what I would do if it were it was for your home and you have children. I would use an indoor outdoor fabric like a umbrella r there's so many people that make the indoor outdoor fabric see say's that air beautiful even some bye trina turk for schumacher that have really fun pattern. So if you needed to bring color pattern in but it's a great way because that you can wash them with soap and water if they are the indoor outdoor anti microbial, they're really, really durable. So I think that would be a great source for you and there's. So many options now they used to be that you just had to have solid colors, which even would look great if you if you only were working with solids. It's great to put a little trim or banding like on this and you could also do that in a contrast in color of the sun umbrella r r an indoor outdoor say cinderella that's not the only brand but it's kind of like kleenex is two tissues. It became the very known name for using I mean for name, for indoor outdoor, but I think that would be a great option and we do that often um and then I loved this honor and it's a totally different type of autumn and that's all toe also multipurpose this particular one is made by hickory chair I use it often but lots of other companies make things like this so it actually has a little inset in the top that's perfectly made for this particular tray sometimes we make custom trays at a blue side or something cool or unique depending on the clients esthetic uh but I love it because it's upholstered and then it has betray on top and then it still has the wood tone at the bottom and it it doesn't have to be stained what it can be painted in any finish there's a lot of option here and it's a it's a pretty large piece I would say it's about thirty inches front to back and maybe about forty eight inches it's about three before eso maybe are two and a half before so large great for in front of a sofa allows you the comfort of an ottoman and also that the thie function of a coffee table so very multi purpose okay let's see what else we have decorative window treatment great for concealing dr avery hardware yes you're getting you're getting good at this I thought you weren't gonna cross us you just get design bed skirt valence in america is the thing that goes over the top of the curtains khun b a cornice card on board, but it was it might be it could even be like the edge of a table. Well, you know anything thie edge ever that covers would be probably a valance so it's like a covering its called, but but it also is a decorative window treatment great for concealing drapery hardware. Um, so ice balances in all sorts of ways, the trend it's not necessarily to use them alone anymore. There was a period of time where people would just put a valance over a window and not that they weren't necessarily intended to be used alone. I don't think, but there's many ways to use them. So the technically over the windows, I would call that a cornice because it's on a hard board it's upholstered but very similar typically a valance is more of a soft, um, hanging fabric from aboard like over the bed, and this when we've used with the bed curtains are what I call a tester, but you can certainly have balances over the windows that look exactly the same, but we use them in all sorts of ways now, most the time again, I don't use them alone some people do just by themselves over the window, but typically if I'm trying not to use a lot of fabric for a budget reason I would go ahead and at least put a roman shade underneath them to make the window look more finished but used over the bed over the window they're very functional because they can hide drapery hardware if you don't want the expense of drapery hardware sometimes it's less expensive teo just use another yarder to a fabric to create a balance as opposed to having decorative hardware here's another option so this one of these air in the same house this is the house that shows you a moment ago with the bathroom that was the historic home and so children's rooms but we were using a lot of antiques so that's what I look very traditional and even a little more traditional than some of my work although my typical color palette usually really bold here but we used antique pieces of furniture that we were painting and refurbishing and re finishing. Uh so we had to really give this a very traditional feel of this home but still make it look young enough for the kids to enjoy. So this is her sister's room and these twin bit antique beds were part of the grandmother's furniture collection and so created this entire wall of drapery with the balance above for these beds toe live under to give it a little more interest to not make them looks give me your small um which is a fun trick to use it takes a lot of fabric but it it adds a lot of impact to the space um and then here's another when this is really kind of more of a corn issa's well this was a a treatment that I did over my daughter's bit david when it was her nursery so it used to be in in our previous house this was our last house so two houses ago this was in her nursery and everything was a completely different color on the walls were tiffany blue and that there was a crib in there and so I knew that I was designing it so that it could go with us to the next house until she got old enough to be out of a twin size bed so this thing became her bed as opposed to just the day bid for the nursery and we brought the whole bed treatment with us so a cornice or a balance they really kind of act in the same way but it's the peace over that hides the hardware and works over the bed okay next one a synthetic material used on wallpapers and chairs generally for easy cleanup you know it was going to say it's a final notice final vinyl so are we haven't any engagement on the on the chat room with any of our questions are answers yeah, they're trying to catch are actually get a little some interesting like cornice was suggested for one that must be in balance yes it's their very similar thing. Yeah it's interesting there's. Some commentary on the room's too. But you know but by the time that's going way back a little on ketchup so vinyl and vinyl you know there's there's good and bad about vinyl it's not the most eco friendly product always so if that's a concern for clients than maybe it doesn't work for them but it is definitely something that is very durable in clean double so I actually do like to use it often in places like this. So this was a home with two young children very active. We saw the kitchen yesterday. We were trying to curb the clutter were trying to help the mom really keep things very, very clean and tidy. And so I used a vinyl for the bench cushion and for the chairs and it allows us to be ableto wife them clean. They even want to use this space in particular, which is when we put the glass on the table top is well for craft project so anytime that you have glue or paint or anything like that it's really a little scary for for moms and parents to have nice things and have those types of activities going on, so this allows a stress free zone for paint why in a watercolor all the things that kids are going to use markers because they can really just be wiped down with the vinyl is that something that would work for you or I think maybe maybe not exactly final but like a pleather or something that has not a port like a not so porous surface and I sort of could put all of those into the same category really like a synthetic leather right a man made material with that kind of a split clean service because we also used leather anything ranging from leather to vinyl for this and then I also often have as we've talked about is well great functional option vinyl coding a really nice thin vinyl coating that feels just like a waxed fabric put on things like the back of this blanket which is a linen so that it can also have the ability to just be cleaned or white is down and it works really great and it doesn't there's different options the companies that do the vinyl coding can do it in different thicknesses and different textures so there's a couple that I think feel really really nice and they're not like what you imagine that the chairs feel like here but something really really soft but so easy to clean really really nice for family environments here's another look at a space that I also did the same thing so the seat here are leather but the back of the bank hair that we can't do it can just barely see is in the same fabric is the drapery so it's a paisley linen fabric really nice, expensive fabric? We didn't want it to get dirty, so we had it vinyl coated as well on the back of this bank it so this is a kitchen, I'm going to show you that before and afters, I think tomorrow and show you really how we transition this space and created the built in bank hit on the end of the island as a space saver it's a really cool transition that I think you'll love seeing, but from from this photo, we're just looking at the idea of the vinyl coding on the bank can't and even pairing it with the leather, and I do that often it's on the bar stool seats on the chair seats because it couldn't all be wiped clean very easily. Um and then here's one more look at the same kind of scenario, so see, I use this often and they all look very different. This one is almost like a patent leather, so it is a faux leather or has this part's probably technically a vinyl, but it has that patent shiny kind of field I wanted something a little more fun, a little more jazzy, even though this client is traditional and so I have it on the bench seat and also on the chair seats which is really fun. So do y'all like any of these rooms see like this idea of having the clean herbal fabrics and surfaces I think it works for you great right was going to say I think your adaptability is to think to use vinyl because in my mind I just think like almost like the oilcloth fabric of, like fifty that's what popped in my head but it comes off really chic thank you so you do think of it is like the old diner chairs in the fifties or a buddhist or something that had like metallic flecks in it and he stuck to it all the time in them in some of these this one is has a little bit of that texture intentionally just to be filling in a little cheeky in this really traditional space but some of the others have like the leather and then the photo leathers have a really nice soft feel to them almost you know, like I almost feel like a kid leather really super soft but very easy to claim that when here's one more look at the kitchen that goes with that breakfast room so I played it also on the bars these acrylic bar stools in the kitchen which is fun and easy way to use it tio of color and I think that's great, because a lot of times I can imagine someone's hesitant tio designed so have something designed that's going to cost some money because, gosh, one spill one pen mark on dh, there goes my super expensive chair, and so this takes some of the that fear factor away and allows someone have something beautiful and not be not having had to be a source of stress, right? Nervous now three and that's what I love about having the vinyl coding put on fabrics because I do love to use and as you can tell, the hot one of the hallmarks of my work is using things even like this chair, I'm sitting in a large pattern. Usually those come on a cotton or linen print, there are print that's, not super durable. It's it's intended these for something that has a light where like a drapery fabric that you're not gonna have a lot of sitting on spilling on hands, touching it, so the ability to speak, to be able to coat that in a way that doesn't really change the fabric that allows me to use it in a lot of different ways, I think is really clever and a wonderful solution. So I agree and I thought when you you had looked like he had like an ah ha moment it reminded jogged my memory that maybe the scenario in your home where your can't decide if you're going to put barstools or not maybe if you did acrylic barstools they would give you the function of sitting there but they would almost be invisible so even if they didn't have a petitions on him there's some great ones that were not very expensive even from cartel which is a really fun brand like the philippe start ghost barstool so something like that might be a fun option toe add function but we leave just go away so I ask you about his basta lt's because it's interesting I know the cartel the ghost stuff that I wonder on those if you rocked backwards on a chair raka if you work backwards on that acrylic do you find that it all pops apart really quickly like fred john like the craft and it's really heavy and they're already so it's not really lightweight like the cartel ones that are very they're very lightweight which is a lot like if you're very light which is a good thing for those if there's something that you're gonna be stacking and moving around a lot for the ghost here the's air much much heavier another much more expensive as well but there's something that is they're they're pretty starting now I mean it's funny because that's the very kind of thing that my clients bring to me and they're like ok I want marcel's but I want to be ableto rock back in them and not fall over said there are some other things that might be a better option for you that aren't acrylic that have some give swivel even a rocking almost motion to bar stools there some iron ones that have a more of a spring to them so it's interesting the kinds of things like we were talking about yesterday when we're making the checklist there are very specific needs just like that from clients and sometimes we kind of laugh at them and go ok the client wants to rock backwards in the bar stool but that's what we deal with in every single home so I'm glad that you mentioned that because people have things of the ways that they like to sit and move and relax and we need that their furniture to accommodate them if it's really going to be functional but these are definitely sturdier um and this is a company that's available to the public it's not up to the trade company you can go to their website plexi I think it's plexi dash craft dot com and I make all sorts of things or they will make things for you so a really neat company I use them often telling the story yesterday about my sister and her a huge family that she had to her twelve dining chairs done in velvet of some kind but each chair was a slightly different color for you saying that on dh they were beautiful but soon is these four boys arrived a different color again tha t twelve different colors of mine but that would have been a great solution because you know final you know white screen and when you have a small family young children it's a great solution well and one of the things I also love to do like we saw in this picture is I love to put vinyl in this one I have the floral fabric on it's actually this exact fabrics that I'm sitting in the same color so that's why I picked this chair this is on the cover of a magazine right now. Um are not this spice but this home but this when I have the fabric on the front and the back of the upper but if we're really concerned about cleanliness and young kids then I'll put the vinyl on the whole inside of the chair and just reserve the what I call the back back of the chair for the decorative fabric so something like your sisters if she had a chair that had fabric on the back you could have that ombre effect all the way around just on the back of the chair which gets very little wear and then you could have put like a vinyl or leather or something very durable, even on indoor outdoor kind of fabric way we think is it because it can absorb stains except from its final is much easier vinyls partier leather it depends on the finish of it and certain things, but usually it can be cleaned if you do it. Pretty soon after there's a stain, she did switch to leather, couch and chairs, and that didn't help it's not very comfortable. Now there's there's, a great company that a friend of mine owns that's a, a company called perennials and it's, an fm even having in our slide on indoor outdoor and green design. I can't remember if I do, but perennials and it's a it's, a toothy tried company said you have to buy through a designer but it's, an indoor outdoor fabric company, and they make exquisite fabrics and she even has an indoor outdoor velvet that looks exactly like a real velvet, but it is clean, herbal, washable and can be inside or outside so really, really beautiful. So for something like a self it's, not inexpensive but like for a formal space or even the pillows on the sofa or something that you really wanted to have some texture and cem beauty, it would have the same type of quality that vinyl would have all right, let's get back to our our questioning our crossword puzzles so going down now this is a railing supported by ballast er's that must be a banister palace not alistair but bella sanest balustrades yes balustrade so that one was a kind of a little tricky or odd because we almost gave you the answer in the in the question right? But a ballast er balustrade are really is it's that whole staircase that we're dealing with a lot of time so it's the other railing on top of it actually and here's an example the same house we were just looking at with the yellow kitchen this is the front living room in the front staircase. So, um something else that we have to deal with a lot of times for it could be functional it khun b decorative it has all kinds of purposes but usually we want them to be pretty and often it's a place where people make a grand design statement this one was existing and it was all stained wood and it was really dark. And so when I did the renovation here I did a combination of painting and staining the newel post the balustrade um and then you have all the ballast er's or spindles but just very functional depending on you know what you're dealing with? Do you have children? Certainly theirs even laws in most states for how far apart the about the ballast er's can be, and there's things about the handrail in the heights that make them more functional for people and children and aging in place. So it's it's, this is kind of where form and function worked together is khun b beautiful, but it's has a great function, tio, and then you can change the look of an entire staircase just by changing this. I just did a whole block post recently on how I want the ballast ir in my new home, too, because I have a curve staircase, which I haven't really had before, and I'm thinking about something like chinese chippendale fretwork, which is more my style, maybe not so traditionalists something like this, but there's a million things you could do from an aesthetic standpoint with the color and the shape and the materials would versus medal on. But they all have a functional element to your spaces. Well, now I mentioned to yesterday told me that my parent's house in which is very old and I think it's, maybe around nineteen hundred when they moved into it the staircase just have white bordelais around, but it did have a beautiful balustrade across the top, and eventually they worked out. What you call the master's heir spent palaces themselves were actually still there. So they removed the covering and why anyone would ever covered it up just on looks like on both sides and painted it. Yes, but but the woods gave the clue because the wood was still there. And it is beautiful. And yeah, that is often the prettiest part of it. Is that handrail, too? So, eh? So here's. Certainly, you know, one kind of option that's. A little more traditional. Um, this was my last house. So much more simple, but I also used two, two turns to paint it. So we have functioned meeting form here, so it needs to be beautiful and functional. And, you know, we've all been on staircases that aires some easier than others. Teo maneuver and to go up and down and the handrail, the balustrade khun definitely have of an effect on how easy it is to use a staircase. So certainly part of the function and being sturdy, not too polished, not too slippery, not too hard to hold onto. Um, one more. Look at it at a different scenario. So a lot of these look pretty traditional. And most the time you think of that in in staircases, but there's some there's some cool modern options to at my parentshouse they haven't in addition that's like a now outdoor facility a gym and work out spice it's really fun and we did plexiglass we did a witten handrail on top as opposed to putting any spindles it's all plexi glass in the middle so there's cool ways that if you're trying to modernize your space and you're dealing with something like this you could change out the the materials and still have something that's really functional for you but is also more modern it would be very safe for children with a place the glass but you might get lots of handprints on it too so and just one more look at something very very ornate and decorative in this scenario okay this is also kind of like almost it's not um it's a little deceiving because it's not hyphenated it's actually to me one word so what we're saying is rail type of molding fixed horizontally to the wall to protect the wall from chairs or denting it get a chair and chair well some of these are a little on the easy side I think chair rail so chair rail is means all sorts of things so here's a fun one that I did recently and underneath it I did the fretwork type of molding that we were talking about so this is in a pool house this room that were actually was seeing justo glimpse of is actually the space where I have the murphy bed that I was talking about yesterday it's a workout space it's in a pool house sort of an et it's too we saw the veranda outside that this went with yesterday with those great black and white during free so this is what's nearby in the pool house and toe workout room but terell has a functional role it does keep chairs from marring the wall that was what it was originally intended for but it also has a very usually now a more decorative more decorative purpose for most of us but I often is chair railing and wanes coating bolo toh add architectural detail ng so we were talking yesterday about getting the bones of your space right and if you do that and add architectural detail ing and interesting moldings to the wall than a lot of times you need less decoration in the space it can add a lot of personality and a lot of decoration by itself so it might be what helps you um be functional and keep the wall from being marred in a dining room space if you are leaning back rocking in your chair sally but really it's become more of an opportunity for us to be decorative something like this so this is chair railing mixed with wanes coating below and this is even another built in bank can't scenario which a lot of people love and breakfast room so I think it's really pretty it adds character so we were looking yesterday at how just adding all of the coffered ceilings and moldings to that kitchen change that space so much and certainly something you can do with chair rails and moldings that go with it, whether it's on the full wall, a paneled wall or just from the chair rail down, which is called wanes, coating or wanes coating any questions or comments so far on this are people liking our our glossary lots of people are asking is very specifically about vinyl coated and we want to go back in there, but they're asking actually for resource is and where you find some particular thank wax coating paperback your fabric to make into wallpaper both jennifer and curious one brought the same company does that I use theirs to company, so I used one called s b I s essence and b as in boy I s p I think um and I can't remember what s b and I stand for, but I'm sure it has something to do with vinyl coding the fabric and they also do the paper backing on the wall covering and then there's another one called custom lamination sze that does the same thing so it's theywill paper backing a fabric what we're talking about there is taking something like this lenin fabricant as supposed to upholstering the walls with padding behind it, which I also do with an upholsterer. You can actually send fabric off to these companies, and they will put a paper back on it so that you can then use paste on it like a wall covering and hang it on the wall flat without, like that puffy, batting upholstered feeling to a wall. Remember, we talked about the likes of them, and it depends on this project because sometimes I love to use the actual upholstered walls where they fill on. Guy actually combined those two ideas often and powder bathrooms or small bathrooms, and I will use a vinyl coding on a fabric like this, but actually traditionally upholstered the wall where it does have batting behind it. So it is a little more, you know, plush. So any of the combination of those things but fbi and this is in the us, and you could probably send to their this company from out of the country. I'm guessing, but one of the things to keep in mind, I think I said this in one of our previous classes that you want to be careful with the fabric that you have vinyl coded a couple of things to think about give you all the instructions on the website but you need to send a little extra fabric because there's some shrinkage so I think they have you send like an extra yard or two depending on how much you're running and then also be careful sending something that is very lineal so a vertical stripe is fine but or anything like a plaid that has a horizontal stripe or one time I did a bathroom which we may see a picture of this week I'm not sure that had like a sunburst design and so they were aligned horizontally and vertically and executed a little bit and it gave my a pollster or fits because I was having having him a pollster bathroom walls in it and the medallions were running up the wall like this so it's better when you have something like this it's really more it's directional as in there's a top to a bottom but there's not it's not really directional horizontal it doesn't matter if it's skews a little because its an all over pattern so something like that a floral a paisley works really, really well when you're putting it through that technique but suggestions for vendors on the low end of the budget spectrum so I'm maurine the you know mass market like cataloged mail order catalogue kind of things like creighton barrel or west down that might have some good options for the's durable fabric well, some of them they're definitely some of those companies that have indoor outdoor fabrics for sure there are also some of them who will allow you to sin what you what they call are what the in the industry we call seo in customers own material so you could too some of them even like a ballard dot com which is um I think out of atlanta are that kind of area but it's a catalogue which you have access to you as well they will do ceo imm on things like those small little benches and tough it's and stools and ottomans. And so you could you could source your own vinyl and send that to them so it's a little more expensive if you send your own fabric but for some pieces that you needed to be durable, it might be a happy medium. And then I loved sources like cartel that we talked about. I think their price points are really nice for bar stools and chairs like the ghost chairs and any of the acrylic things I think they're a great source for that, but look at the look at the fabric samples from a lot of those companies we use those a lot for our design in the box product got inbox interiors because we source if he if we design for a design for you a design in a box for you, we want you to be ableto find things that are like our first word accessible to you, so we select things like like those same cos you were talking about crichton barrel um smith and hawkin for window treatments and front gate and also times kinds of catalog mail order types of suppliers and a lot of those have sample so you can call and request samples and they can send them tio and just request the ones that are the indoor outdoor you have quite a few of those almost seventies modern, like they have quite a thick textile, they have a lot of things that finishes that will wipe off things that feel more like lacquered finishes and leathers and a lot of those kinds of, you know, textures. Now, the thing about dickie that's a little difficult for some of us is they don't have as many things that you could manage that you can get online usually have to get them in the store, right? And so in my area, we don't have a nike the closest one is in dallas, which is about four hours away, so I have a dallas office now I go to like you and I'm there if I need something but for some, for some regions, it's hard to get access to a key, but in cities like you are here, it's, easy to go in and just they're they're merchandise turns over a lot, so you never know exactly what they're gonna have it any given time, but some things they keep in the line for a long time, and they have a lot of those, like even the shelving units and things that are covered in more before mica type of finish all of those were going to be real easy toe white, clean, very much designed with durability in mind. Now they might not be sturdy toe last for lots of years, but usually they're clean a ble pretty clean nable material. While we doing materials, pig asks if you have a source for the indoor outdoor velvet fabric that you mentioned perennials well, that was print or any als, so perennials is a little is a higher in company, but great if you use it in small doses or, uh maybe it's that one splurge item, but the great thing about splurging on perennials is it's clean, herbal. So kind of like, I guess melissa released the one one of them were saying a little bit ago, if you're going to splurge and you're gonna make your house really nice it's, nice to have the peace of mind. I think you were saying that, lisa, that you can clean it if you're going to invest in this for kids. So definitely something to think about.

Class Materials

bonus material with Purchase

Glossary of Design Terms.pdf
How To Photograph.pdf
How to Measure.pdf

Ratings and Reviews

a Creativelive Student
 

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Tobi!!!! She is a wealth of information and her cup flows over with ideas. The course was sometimes hard for me as I found the studio audience distracting and felt like they took away from the class. Not to sound heartless, but I personally don't care about their issues and problems and going on and on about themselves and their opinions. I am paying for this course to learn from Tobi, not someone that doesn't have anymore knowledge than me. I just want to drink from the hydrant that Tobi has to offer. My time is limited and so wading through the audience participation was often frustrating. Tobi was amazing though. Thank you Creative Live!!

Amy Cantrell
 

I enjoyed this course even though the pace is a bit slow at times. Happy that I bought it on sale. My favorite concept is "use the space you have".

a Creativelive Student
 

I would like to know who makes the fabric on the black and white chair in Tobi's Function driven interior design segment? Thank you, and I am so loving all of my classes that I purchased!

Student Work

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